The Life-Sized City Blog

There was a tweet today from a gentleman named Ben Hammersley on Twitter : The bicycle pump in Copenhagen airport's baggage hall is an epic sign of civilization. Cheers me up every time. So here's a photo we found of it via azubcz on Picasa . It's one of those details in Copenhagen's bicycle culture that we just haven't gotten around to featuring. So here's the perfect opportunity. Used for bicycles, of course, but many prams have chunky tires as well and I've used it when arriving home with a pram, to top up the air for the journey home on the Metro. It's all in the details.

The City of Copenhagen issued a press release last Friday about how the City's stash of salt for the roads and bicycle lanes is very low due to the snowstorms of the past few weeks. Salting: Bicycle Lanes and the main roads have the highest priority Because of the hard winter conditions of the past several weeks there is a shortage of road salt all over Denmark, including Copenhagen. We must therefore prioritize which roads and paths we salt. At the moment we are prioritising the bicycle lanes/cycle tracks as well as the main approach roads to the city, so that the police and ambulances can get in. Nice to see they have their priorities right. And even with another snowstorm on it's way to Denmark - the third in a week - the bicycle lanes must be kept clear.

Pling. All of sudden this little bicycle-friendly detail showed up on the urban landscape in Copenhagen one day. I'm quite sure that very few people have noticed it, except for the people who roll up next to it. Which is the point, really. I'm talking about the railings that the man is holding onto and resting his foot on. It's located on a little traffic island on which cyclists who are heading straight on wait. The City of Copenhagen has implemented this double railing simply as a convenience for the cyclists who stop here. A high railing to grasp with your hand and a foot railing for putting your foot up, if that's what you fancy doing. Either way you can also use the railing to push off when the light changes. The foot rest reads: " Hi, cyclist! Rest your foot here... and thank you for cycling in the city. " Another example of the city using the 'Hi, cyclist!' behavourial campaign/communications template that I developed for them. It's a tiny ...

The focus on the cycling life of Denmark in general and Copenhagen in particular came out of nowhere when Copenhagen Cycle Chic and this blog launched a couple of years ago. The international focus on reestablishing the bicycle as a feasible, acceptable and respected transport form has increased steadily and shows no sign of diminishing. The result is that cities, towns, cycling groups and even nations are become hungry to learn about the experience of cycling friendly cities, towns and nations and how they achieved their goals. They are knocking on the doors of Denmark and Holland and arriving on study trips. I've had the pleasure of meeting a few hundred people over the past year or so who have come to Copenhagen to see what we do. We've gone for bike rides around the city or sat in cafés and discussed. Based on this intense interest, it's natural that the Cycling Embassy of Denmark has gotten onboard. The embassy is comprised of various stakeholders in the cycling comm...

My friend Marie and I were inspired to write a letter a couple of years ago to the City of Copenhagen with a long list of good ideas that Copenhagen should consider in order to cater more to cyclists and brand cycling better. As fate would have it, Marie is now working at the City's Bicycle Office and I'm a senior consultant but one of those ideas was inspired by a photo sent to me by David Hembrow in Holland. David writes the A View from the Cycle Path blog - a must read. Anyway, garbage bins for cyclists. I blogged about it a year and a half ago . Raised up and tilted towards the cyclists, offering them a better hit ratio. I recieved this photo from the Bicycle Office the other day. There are right now a handful of prototypes of a tilted garbage bin along some routes aimed at cyclists who have problems aiming. Brilliant stuff although to be honest, I think this prototype design needs some improvements. It could be mistaken for a garbage bin that was bumped by a car and bent....

It's the new bicycle parking terminal outside Union Station in Washington, DC. Opening very soon, if not already. There'll be, if I recall correctly, parking for 150 bicycles, a shop/workshop, changing rooms for the cyclists who go too fast [:-)] and lockers. Outside of opening hours subscribers can gain access with a card. It's a useful and practical addition to the city but it's much, much more than that. Firstly, it's an eye-catching design. A little architectural monument. It sends many more signals than "see, I'm a pretty, modern building!" It sends signals to the city at large that the bicycle isn't really going anywhere. That the people riding bicycles you're seeing around town are here to stay. There may even be more on the way. Get used to it. It's an important visual landmark that with it's permanence is telling the citizens that bicycles are, and deserve to be, an accepted, respected and increasingly established transport for...

I've mentioned this before but I haven't seen it for a while. Until today. This is a unique way of advertising in Copenhagen. Printing rain covers for bike seats with [insert your product of message here] and then slap them onto hundreds of bikes. These ones were outside the university and advertised for a job and career convention where students can learn about different job opportunities. Other times it's a product or an event.

15 accidents per year in Copenhagen's most dangerous intersection has been reduced to just one. The results are quite concrete after Copenhagen City redesigned the intersection at Gyldenloevsgade and Soegade by The Lakes in inner Copenhagen a year ago. In Copenhagen, many intersections have both traffic lights for cars and separate ones for bikes . The solution was coordinating the bike traffic lights to change to green a couple of seconds before the cars. A simple solution. It is worth noting that the intersection is a major cycle artery for bike commuters. Over 25,000 cyclists a day on weekdays cross the intersection. If you calculate that there are 260 weekdays in a year, that means that 6,500,000 million bikes cross the intersection annually. With that in mind, 15 serious accidents is not a bad statistic. Reducing that to one is spectacular. The intersection in question: Via: DR P4

The fact that cycling is healthy is not a newsflash. However, as we highlighted in a previous post over at Copenhagen Cycle Chic , about why this city rides bikes so much, the majority of Copenhageners don't ride primarily to save the world or because they're health fanatics. According to the study: 54% ride because it is easy and fast . 19% ride because of the benefits of excercising. 7% ride because it is cheap. 6% ride because it is handy. 1% ride because of the environmental benefits. Nevertheless, the Copenhagen City Council - in their Biannual Cycle Report - had the consultancy company Trafitec rate the societal and health aspects of our bicycle culture. While these figures are specific to Copenhagen, based on our current levels of health and welfare, the results and stats are interesting nonetheless. Just the facts: - Physically active people live ca. 5 years longer than the physically inactive. - Physically inactive persons suffer on average for four more years from len...

So many good ideas, so little time. We were thrilled to hear about a proposed cycle tunnel in the city of Bodø, Norway . The city wishes to become a cycling city on a par with many other European cities. The main hurdle is that Bodø is located in the far north of Norway, at the mercy of North Atlantic and, worse, Arctic winds. Hurdles are, however, meant to be jumped over. This is Scandinavia, design capital of the known universe, so some clever thinkers starting jumping. Bodø has a population of 40,000 wind blown inhabitants and the idea is to build an 8 km long tube from the city centre to the College of Higher Education. Clear plastic plates would be used and openings would provide ventilation. It's all still being decided, as far as we can see, but the idea is great. Read more about it here . It reminds us of an idea for a Danish bridge - Storebæltsbroen - when it was being planned. At that time it was to be the longest bridge of it's kind in the world. Some bright minds pr...

Cycling Weather , originally uploaded by [Zakkaliciousness] . This is from one of the national newspapers here in Denmark. A daily forecast for Cycling Weather, including wind strength and direction and a reminder for when it is mandatory for turning on your bike lights. Commuting by bike is serious business in Denmark.

Our bike culture has come a long way over the past century and a bit. Back in the day, in the late 1800's, riding bikes was not considered cool. Cyclists were spit on and heckled [kind of like riding in American cities in 2007...] because cycling was viewed as a disturbance. Indeed, cycling in some Danish cities was illegal. The town of Slagelse, for example, first legalised cycling in 1885. Since then, however, we've gone from strength to strength, creating one of the world's leading bike nations and the world's foremost bike city - Copenhagen. Above: The train station in Odense, Denmark in the 1940's. Note the bike racks on the right. The same as these ones in a Copenhagen backyard. Above: Manned bike parking in Odense, Denmark during WW2. An association that battled unemployment set up safe bike parking facilities so you could leave you bike behind for a cheap price - 25 øre - and not worry about your tyres getting stolen. Rubber was rationed. Another manned bik...

I love these groovy little street sweepers. They are designed to fit perfectly on the bike lanes of the city. In the winter they also have snowplough versions in the same size that keep the bike lanes clear. Another example of how an established bicycle culture breeds the necessity of developing relevant gadgets to maintain them.